Interview takes a look inside Theaster Gates’s recently completed Stony Island Arts Bank on the south side of Chicago, and the artistic impetus behind the project.  “I often meet people who live in my neighborhood, when I’m downtown or in other neighborhoods, and we’re all looking for the same amenities,” he says.  “We all want to go to the reggae spot up north, we all want to go to the jazz club downtown. So I think that being here, I’m thinking about, “What are the amenities that I want to benefit from?” In their absence, I feel like, “All right, maybe I should make them.” (more…)

The Stony Island Arts Bank, a 70,000-square-foot renovation in Chicago by Theaster Gates, will open October 3, coinciding with the beginning of the Chicago Architecture Biennial.  “This is a new kind of cultural amenity, a new kind of institution—a hybrid gallery, media archive and library, and community center,” Gates says. “It is an institution of and for the South Side—a repository for African American culture and history, a laboratory for the next generation of black artists and culture-interested people; a platform to showcase future leaders—be they painters, educators, scholars, or curators.” (more…)

The Armory Show’s creative director, Michael Hall, has taken a position at Hauser & Wirth. Hall’s involvement ranged from the Armory’s Open Forum and Armory Film programs to the “Armory Focus” sections; he also took part in the selection of commissioned artists such as Theaster Gates and Liz Magic Laser. The co-founder and former director, Paul Morris, resigned in September after an 18-year tenure with the fair. It was reported by Art In America earlier this year that The Armory Show’s parent company, Merchandise Mart Properties,  may be  in negotiations to sell it along with the Volta Show and Art Platform Los Angeles.  (more…)

Artist and urban planner Theaster Gates has been named as the recipient of its inaugural Vera List Center Prize for Art and Politics by The New School. The $15,000 prize will be awarded to an artist every two years. The List Center was named for the philanthropist Vera List, who died in 2002. (more…)

Theaster Gates – Raising Goliath (2012), courtesy White Cube Gallery

The work of Theaster Gates addresses social engagement using shared images of American life as a way to challenge cultural norms and to subvert singular readings of American history.  White Cube Bermondsey is hosting a major installation by the Chicago-based artist, entitled “My Labor is My Protest.”  Blending the cultural, social and personal, the show is a bold statement on the roles of identity and meaning in the construction of history and art history.

Theaster Gates – My Labor Is My Protest (Installation View) (2012), courtesy White Cube Gallery (more…)

The WSJ Magazine profiles Theaster Gates, a sculptor, performance artist and urban planner from Grand Crossing, a mostly-black neighborhood south of downtown Chicago, and his work, which goes further than social commentary.  Gates focuses on rebuilding and re-contextualizing spaces, not only as part of his artistic practice- but also in a real and effective way that transforms lower income communities. (more…)